


Hibernation

by Whimsical_in_the_Brainpan



Series: All I Have Known [2]
Category: Les Misérables (2012), Les Misérables - All Media Types, Les Misérables - Schönberg/Boublil, Les Misérables - Victor Hugo
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, F/M, Finals, Full of fluff, Lots of college kids stuck in too-close quarters, M/M, Multi, Short Interlude Chapter, Studying, and Filler
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-29
Updated: 2013-04-29
Packaged: 2017-12-09 22:46:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,826
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/778830
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Whimsical_in_the_Brainpan/pseuds/Whimsical_in_the_Brainpan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There's a tradition amongst the Amis every time midterms or finals rolls around. Everyone goes to Joly, Bossuet, and Musichetta's house with some clothes, a sleeping bag, food, and all their work, and nobody leaves for a week.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hibernation

**Author's Note:**

> Wow, look at me! I've got an interlude, and it's not completely filled with angst. As a matter of fact, I'm writing FILLER!! It's wonderful! I've never written a filler interlude before. This is set about a month to a month and a half after the events of Lost in Fallacy, during the week before finals. 
> 
> For the longest time, I didn't know what to call it, so it was just called "Actual Filler Fluff." Now it actually has a name, but I felt like I had to mention this and give homage to its original name.

In the strictest confidence, Joly had told him from one of the first meetings that he would love the week leading up to midterms and finals. At the time, Jehan really hadn’t believed the pre-med. This was within his first two weeks of school, and he had been sure that this was some elaborate prank that the senior was pulling on the terrified little freshman.

But then, he really became a part of the Amis and everything changed. They may be a student club, with funding and whatnot, but it didn’t feel like other clubs. For starters, most clubs only met once or twice a week. The Amis would meet at least three times a week, officially, and the other three or four were almost always filled with nights at the Corinth hanging out, afternoons at the Café Musain lounging and doing homework, and various miscellany at each other’s dorms. When he signed up for the social justice group, he hadn’t expected all this. But he was practically overwhelmed with how much he hadn’t realized that he needed it. 

Jehan had spent the past four years bouncing back and forth between friend’s houses, and counting down the days until he wore out his welcome. After that, it had been YMCA’s and children’s centers, just trying to make it through high school and get into college. Once he was finally in, his roommate was loud and intrusive, plastic bagging the smoke detector and sexiling him out into the common room couch far too often.

At the club fair, he had seen Enjolras, Combeferre, and Courfeyrac handing out pamphlets and shouting about equal rights. He’d signed up because he liked the causes. Within the first two weeks, Jehan had a family again. His first in four years.

He filled up the entirety of one of his poetry notebooks in those first two weeks.

They even found out about his head injury pretty quickly, and they weren’t fazed by it. They didn’t treat him more delicately, as if he might shatter at any second, or turn around and make him into their next cause, like he’d feared. And when he found out that his roommate was stealing his Tylenol without telling him, the others had all offered up spare couches or inflatable mattresses that he could stay in at any time.

It didn’t even feel like he was being passed around again. Because eventually, he had his own space in Feuilly’s apartment, a drawer waiting for him at Bahorel’s enormous single, and Courfeyrac had elevated his bed specifically to make room for an inflatable mattress underneath. He was never on a timer, waiting until he had to move again. Instead, Jehan suddenly had a multitude of homes waiting for him, with family at every one.

But when late October hit, and everyone was gearing up for midterms he finally got to see Joly proven right. The Amis had a tradition for midterms and finals. A lot of suite housing had study parties, where everyone in the suite would bring their work out into the common area and work together. The Amis had taken that idea, put it on steroids, and let it go wild. They didn’t just work together, they locked themselves away from the outside world and lived together.

Since Bossuet was a grad student, and Joly was a Senior, they were renting a small house together with their girlfriend, Musichetta. That meant that every time midterms and finals week came around, they were always forced into hosting the collective hibernation. Everyone would bring large quantities of food, sleeping bags or pillows and blankets, basic essentials, and all of their work. Then, the Amis would spend the entire week practically never leaving each other’s sight.

Midterms had been wonderful, as Jehan experienced the study isolation for the first time. Everyone’s clashing study habits and tricks all bounced off of each other, there was a massive music sharing session, they would all chip in to order Chinese, and they supported each other through everyone’s occasional freak outs.

One of Jehan’s favorite parts though, was that besides the trio (who preferred to stay in their room when they did sleep), all of the Amis crashed in the living room in a gigantic huddle of sleeping bags, blankets, and pillows. It was like a gigantic sleepover, and in the mornings it wasn’t uncommon to wake up with Bahorel spread out on top of at least five of them.

Even though he ended up spending about two nights a week in one of the Amis’ rooms, it was a special treat to crash with all of them for so long. He didn’t had to worry about if his blankets were really clean (twice he had caught his roommate and one of his conquests having sex in his bed), or if he was going to get sexiled again, or if their room reeked like the inside of a bong. He could just be with friends. And the group cuddling that almost always happened was nice too.

Last time had been mid-October, just less than a week after Enjolras’ first argument with Grantaire over the death penalty. Everyone had been scared that their leader would ruin the tradition, but luckily he managed to move on from it before they all started living together. Even so, Enjolras wasn’t the easiest person during finals. The man would commandeer the entire kitchen area, including the large table, to spread out all of his notes, assignments, and organizers. Enjolras surrounded himself in his system, and no one was allowed to so much as breath near the room. When their leader slept and ate, well, that was anybody’s guess because he was asleep long after everyone else had conked out, and was awake and working before everyone got up. Combeferre was the only one brave enough to drag him away for the course of meals.

It was mid-December now, and finals were starting to approach again. As sad as it was that Feuilly had to work and couldn’t be a part of it, and Grantaire would only occasionally be popping in with food deliveries, Jehan was excited for his second hibernation. Cosette and Éponine would be added to the group (although Cosette won’t be able to sleep over because her father was far too overprotective) and he couldn’t wait to see what would happen this time around.

The first indicator of the insanity awaiting him at the impending sleepover came in the form of Courfeyrac running up to him in the cafeteria and announcing, “You’ve got to help me steal a pie.”

Jehan lifted his gaze away from the salad in front of him and looked up at his excited friend.

“Um, okay. Why is that?” he asked, puzzled but smiling.

“Because I don’t have a large enough quantity of food to bring to hibernation tomorrow, and I can’t let Pontmercy beat me again!” Courfeyrac said, waving his fists in the air at the mention of his roommate.

“What are you talking about? For midterms you smuggled forty brownies out of here using nothing but a Ziploc bag and a sweatshirt,” Jehan said with a laugh.

“And Pontmercy went out and bought two pounds of salted pistachio nuts, which everyone finished within three hours!” the sophomore whined. “It’s always been my dream to get an entire pie out of the cafeteria in its tin without the watchdog spotting me. Don’t you want to help me fulfill my dream!”

Courfeyrac pointed to the woman at the door to the cafeteria, swiping students in. There were two women hired to swipe the cards, and admittedly, the one on guard now was the stricter one. Once they were all eating dinner together and Joly wanted to bring an apple back with him. The man would let kids walk out with an apple, or a cookie, or something small like that. But the woman ended up snapping at Joly for two minutes and refusing to let him leave with the apple. Ever since then Courfeyrac, ever the loyal friend to them all, went out of his way to smuggle food from under her nose. At first it had been an apple or a cookie, but he had gotten more ambitious. Now, his goal was an entire pie.

His backpack, like everyone else’s, was checked by the door, behind the bitter woman. Inside his was a nearly untouched economy sized box of Frosted Flakes that he had bought on his last Walmart trip with Bahorel. It definitely couldn’t fit a pie, but even if it could, the pies that the cafeteria put out for desserts didn’t have packaging. It was left on the counters open, and since all of them were cream pies (today was chocolate cream) they didn’t even have the benefit of a pastry crust to protect them. Courfeyrac couldn’t just smuggle a pie under his sweater like with the brownies.

“You can’t cover it with anything without destroying it.”

“Oh I know,” Courfeyrac said mischievously. “I plan on just walking out the front door with it in my arms.”

“Yes, I’m sure Margaret will have no problem with that,” he said softly, tilting his head up in a wry smile.

“You know her name?” Courfeyrac asked in an almost disbelieving voice before shaking his head. “You know what, doesn’t matter. What’s important is me using you as a human shield while I walk past her.”

Jehan arched an eyebrow at his friend. “You know the rest of the kitchen staff wouldn’t let you walk out with a whole pie either. You’d need an entire secret service to pull this off.”

“Jehan,” the sophomore drew out the vowels in a whine, a pout on his face. “Please! You’ll be my favorite person ever! We’ll be like Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid! Andy Dufresne and Red! Agents J and K. Han Solo and Luke Skywalker…”

“Okay,” Jehan gave in, cutting his friend off before he could come up with any more names from buddy movies. His cheeks were flushed slightly, and he tilted his head down while busying himself with cleaning up the remnants of his meal. “How do you want me to do this?”

There was no way this was ending well.

\-----

“I need to use your shower.”

Joly grinned smugly at Bossuet, completely ignoring the rude gesture he got in response. He spent the entire day cleaning the house, despite Bossuet’s protests that the Amis would just start making a mess of everything when they got in. That’s why he did it though. For the next week, there would be sleeping bags, papers, crushed snack foods, and all other manner of evidence that about ten college kids were all trying to live in one room together.

Before every hibernation he and Bossuet would bet on how quickly it would take the others to completely overrun the house. This year he thought he’d been taking a risk by betting on before the end of dinner tonight.

Clearly he could’ve risked more than the twenty bucks he put in, because there Courfeyrac was, standing in their doorway shirt soaked and bits of food in his hair. Next to him, Jehan was standing with what looked like a beautiful cream pie in his hands, and a huge backpack filled with what could only be provisions for the next week.

“What happened?” Bossuet asked, moving to grab a first aid kit from the kitchen as he ran to fetch some spare towels.

“Jehan, you brought a pie?” Joly asked at the same time.

“No!” Courfeyrac whined as he accepted a towel. “I brought the pie! My pie!”

“I don’t get credit now?” Jehan asked as he brought the pie to the kitchen counter, just looking downright amused.

“Is that what you call giving cover?” Courfeyrac asked.

“Is that what you call running?” Jehan shot back with a smile, unloading the pie and a Walmart-sized box of Frosted Flakes. “If I knew you were going to stroll…”

“No one uses my shower until you tell me what happened,” Joly snapped, cutting off the Butch Cassidy banter. “Start by what your shirt is dripping on my floor.”

“You know the bitchy cafeteria lady who yelled at you that one time over that apple?”

He and Bossuet swapped a look, already not liking where this was going. Jehan came back from the kitchen and started unpacking his backpack, claiming the old arm chair in the living room as his own. The poet had a huge grin on his face.

“Yes,” Bossuet supplied for them both tentatively.

No one in the group particularly liked Margaret from the cafeteria, but ever since the apple incident last year, Courfeyrac and her seemed to be locked in an epic battle of wits. He had honestly been afraid that this resentment would deteriorate into strip searches and elaborate escapes through the ventilation system.

“Well, if you try to smuggle a pie out of the cafeteria while she’s eating, she will not hesitate to take you down.”

“She threw her chicken noodle soup at him,” Jehan supplied. “I saved the pie.”

Oh. Well, Joly didn’t really know what else he should have expected.

“Are there any…”

“No burns, I already checked,” Jehan said sweetly.

“It wasn’t hot, just lukewarm and sticky,” Courfeyrac grumbled, already taking off his shoes and heading towards the bathroom.

From down the hall, the bathroom door shut, and after a moment, the pipes groaned and Joly heard the water turn on. Well, that was one problem solved. Honestly, he didn’t know why he and Bossuet agreed to host this week long sleepover every time. Of course it made sense to everyone else. They have a house, so there aren’t downstairs neighbors to scream them out, just Musichetta who had to wake up early for work. The benefit of having his own room to escape to after a day in the unsanitary living room was always a plus though.

Before he could move to clean up the soup stains on the wood floors, Bossuet was there behind him with the Swiffer, laying a reassuring hand on his arm and going to clean up the mess. His expression was clear. _Rest. You’ve been cleaning all day._ The sight made him melt every time.

His boyfriend didn’t really care about the cleanliness of the house, and was content to leave dishes to soak in the sink for a few hours. But he knew how Joly felt about it, and could see when the hypochondria was starting to overtake him. Sometimes even before he himself knew.

Joly went to his desk and pulled out the medical textbook and his notes from his first class, and set up his own workspace on the right corner of the couch. Slowly, the others started to trickle in, with Combeferre and Enjolras first, and Bahorel next, bringing Éponine with him.

Since Bahorel was the only one with a car, (well, he used to be. The moment everyone learned about Grantaire’s minivan, half the group was ambushing him with affection) he was often tasked with picking Feuilly up for meetings. Since Grantaire couldn’t be part of the giant sleepover, Bahorel had volunteered to pick Éponine up.  

They had all been working in the living room for about ten minutes when Combeferre looked up, seemingly caught off guard, and asked, “Who’s in the shower?”

“Courfeyrac,” Joly quickly supplied. “He was soup bombed in the caf.”

“That’s odd; I don’t see his bag anywhere.”

“That’s because he didn’t have it with him at lunch,” Jehan groaned.

“So you’re telling me that you let _Courfeyrac_ into your shower without a change of clothes?” Combeferre demanded incredulously. And to be fair, when he put it like that, it sounded like something only an idiot would do. Joly grumbled into his hands.

“You know he’s just going to saunter back into the living room buck-ass naked,” Bahorel deadpanned, rolling his eyes at him and Bossuet. It looked like he was judging them for letting him step in their shower. And quite frankly, Joly was judging himself a little too.

Therefore, it was through nothing less than sheer godsend when Marius walked in with Cosette in toe, holding two gigantic bags in his arms.

“Hey, Courf left this morning without his bag so I figured…”

Marius never got to finish his sentence before half of the Amis had run up to him, cheering and slapping him on the back. Joly would neither confirm, nor deny the possibility that he went up to hug the awkward ginger gratefully.

“What…?”

“Courf’s in the shower and he doesn’t have a change of clothes,” Éponine supplied upon seeing Marius’ perplexed face.

At that moment, the sound of rushing water in the pipes stopped, and everyone turned to look at the hallway nervously. Courfeyrac had a terrible habit of placing his comfort over societal conventions, particularly during hibernation time.

“I’ll deal with him,” Marius said casually before rummaging through Courfeyrac’s bag, digging out a handful of clothes, and walking towards the bathroom.

Everyone stared after him, shocked. Normally Marius was the most socially awkward, bumbling one among them. The look that Bossuet shot him made Joly grin. His eyebrows were halfway up his head, and he mouthed to him, “ _what a brave soul_.”

“Hey Courf, I brought your bag. Here are some clothes.” They could hear Marius talking at the door to the bathroom from down the hall.

“But I’m still wet,” Courfeyrac whined back.

“Then dry off, put on your clothes, and _then_ come back out,” Marius replied in a no-nonsense tone. “If you’ll remember, I’ve brought my _girlfriend_ with me. The same girlfriend who bakes us madeleines, and doesn’t want to see your dick.”

“What if I just…”

“No. Pants are required as well, Courf.”

There was a long pause before, “Fine. Just leave them at the door.”

A few moments later, Marius walked back to the group and began unpacking his law books on the floor next to Cosette and Éponine, completely oblivious to the fact that all of the Amis, save Enjolras and the women were staring at him in awe.

Joly, for his part, had never had more respect for Marius. The guy was a bit of a dreamer at times, and had his moments of alarmingly naïve stupidity. And as much as they loved the guy and accepted him as one of them, there was only so much they could take of him in one sitting. Be it hours of gushing over his deceased father’s relatively outdated ideals, or hours of gushing over Cosette’s sheer beauty, the kid got a bit obsessive.

As a group, they often joked about Courfeyrac’s incredible patience levels to be able to live with his many Pontmercy-isms. But Courfeyrac had just as many, if not more strange quirks and habits than the awkward boy, and was almost twice as stubborn when being told off. Marius’ tolerance levels must be through the roof.

A few minutes later, Courfeyrac emerged from down the hall, hair still dripping wet but in a pair of long black sweatpants and a Batman t-shirt. With little more than a wide smile, the sophomore took his place leaning against the side of the arm chair and cracked open the books that Marius had already set up for him.

About forty minutes passed of silent organization and work before Joly looked around, and found that he was missing one of his textbooks.

“Hey, has anyone seen my molecular genetics?” Joly asked, searching around his spot on the couch for where he’d left it.

“Um, I have it,” Cosette said, unapologetic but embarrassed.

He turned to look at the blonde freshman, and couldn’t help but let out a bark of laughter at the sight beneath him. Cosette Fauchelevent ever since becoming Marius’ girlfriend had started attending meetings, and from what little they knew about her so far, she was an unusual person. She was one of the most innocently happy people he’d ever met, and seemed to live in her own world most of the time. And the sweetly harmless brand of kleptomania that Joly had diagnosed her with was probably the darkest part of her.

Somehow, without him (or anyone else, judging by their expressions) noticing, she had managed to surround herself in a circle of everyone’s things. By himself, Joly could identify his and Marius’ textbooks, Bahorel’s fancy sneakers, one of Jehan’s flowery notebooks, Courfeyrac’s Ellie, Enjolras’ favorite red jacket (how the Hell had she managed that?), and Bossuet’s pencil case.

“Okay,” he said when he realized that she wasn’t going to get there on her own. “Can I have it back?”

“But it’s at the very bottom,” she said with indecision in her voice. “Would it be okay to borrow mine, or does yours have specific notes in it?”

Everyone stared at Cosette in utter confusion, as she obliviously pulled another copy of Molecular Genetics out of her bag and offered it to him. Joly was a senior this year and already starting to take a few graduate level classes, this one being one of them. Cosette, being a freshman (not to mention, being so… Cosette) seemed like the last person to have a spare copy.

“You’re taking Molecular Gen?” he asked incredulously as he accepted her book.

“Yeah,” she shrugged.

“Just for shits and giggles I suppose?” Bossuet prompted further when she failed to elaborate.

Cosette looked up with a confused grin, and only just noticed that she had an entire room staring at her in bewilderment. After meeting her, everyone had guessed that she was probably a drama major, or otherwise general studies.

“No, I want to go into medical research,” she said. “I’m double majoring that alongside woman’s studies.”

Well of course she was.

“Who do you have? Caligari?” Joly asked, if only to snap everyone out of the same confusion he was suffering from. In the back of his mind, he wondered if harsh paradigm shifts could cause a temporary imbalance in the brain’s chemistry.

“No, I’ve got Zerna, but I think they’re collaborating on the tests,” she said, then sat up with a big grin. “Hey. Want to study together?”

“Okay,” Joly agreed after a moment.

“But you can’t disrupt the circle,” she said with a sudden stern frown, pointing at him in what he thought was supposed to be threatening.

Instead, he just chuckled good-naturedly and said, “I think I can manage that.”

If Marius’ new girlfriend was a little bizarre, well so what? The rest of them were pretty insane as well, so she might just fit right in. As he moved his stuff to the ground (carefully, so as not to bump into her circle of everyone’s things) the Amis went out of their way to prove his point. Bahorel, Combeferre, and Éponine (all of whom were forced to sit on the floor) lunged up towards the couch seat that he’d just vacated. Éponine actually went over the living room table to reach it. Miraculously, Combeferre won out and replaced his spot on the couch.

Joly looked up at the group of his closest friends in the world, all curled up in his living room. Studying for finals was never anything less than stressful, and there was no changing that, but somehow, he’d found a group that could make it a little easier just by being there.

And hey, he might have a new study partner as well.

\-----

After the first night, the living room was a mess. The main reason is because everyone basically just shoved their books and bags out of the way, pulled out the sleeping bags and blankets, and fell asleep in the same spot they’d been working in. And in the morning, most of them pack their sleeping gear away and get back to work, but Courfeyrac operated a bit different.

For him, once his sleeping bag is out it’s out for good, and he’s comfortable working, eating, and brushing his teeth in the giant sleeve. Of course, he’s not really used to sleeping in pajamas (or anything that functions as pajamas for that matter), so he got hot inside the sleeping bag, and regularly moved along varying levels of dressed.

And although everyone groaned about it, and yelled at him to put on some damn clothes, they were more or less used to it by midmorning on that second day.

To be fair, he was never fully naked. Boxers were as far as he chose to strip down to, because he didn’t want Cosette to threaten an end to the madeleines, and there was just something really awkward about sitting on that sleeping bag fabric without underwear as protection.

As always, when he did wake up there was already a pot of coffee brewed. Carefully Courfeyrac navigated through the pile of bodies that was his friends, shuffling along in his sleeping bag as quietly as possible so as not to wake them. Sleep was (naturally) a rare treasure to obtain during finals week.

After pouring himself a large mug of the strong coffee, he wandered into the dining room, where he found the only other conscious member of the house.

“Morn’ Enjy,” he croaked out, not fully awake yet.

“Morning Courfeyrac,” the blond replied politely, eyes never leaving his laptop.

Courfeyrac had always been a morning person. No matter what had happened the night before, or how little sleep he’d gotten, he was always awake at 7:30 on the dot. So it came as a huge shock to him during their first hibernation last year when Enjolras had been awake before him.

By now though, he’d come to accept that their leader was just a special brand of insane. The political science major was always the last one asleep every single day of hibernation, and always awake and working before everyone. On top of that, Enjolras seemed to be fueled entirely on coffee, 5-Hour ENERGY, and sheer determination. No one could quite figure out when he took the time to change his clothes or brush his teeth, and the Amis practically had to pin him to the ground once a day so Combeferre could force him to eat something.

“Okay, you never let me call you Enjy unless you’re sleep deprived or roofied,” Courfeyrac said suspiciously as he poured himself a bowl of Fruit Loops, courtesy of Éponine. “What’s wrong?”

“Everyone is sleep deprived during finals week,” Enjolras shot back.

“Not on day one, they’re not. What happened?”

Enjolras sighed, and looked up to meet Courfeyrac’s stare. And through some miracle, Courfeyrac managed to hold the gaze, even while he moved around the kitchen to get at the fridge. He opened the door and grabbed the peanut butter jar, then stuck it in the microwave for twenty seconds, before dumping two large tablespoons into his Fruit Loops.

“That’s disgusting you know.”

Courfeyrac took a large bite of the peanut butter fruit loop mixture and gave Enjolras a wide open-mouthed smile to piss him off.

“Breakfast of champions. So what happened?”

“My professor just got back to me about a research paper outline last night, and he thinks it’s too broad a topic. He said that if I wanted to cover all of it, I would go way over the twenty page limit.”

“And when you tried to write it to prove him wrong, you hit…?” Courfeyrac asked with a knowing smirk.

Enjolras sighed. “Forty six.”

After affording himself a small chuckle at the blond’s expense and offering a sympathetic slap on the back, he poured coffee for Jehan, Joly, and Combeferre. The three of them always asked to be woken up early, so it had just become routine.

Joly, like the blossoming medical professional he was, awoke instantly if Courfeyrac waved a mug of coffee under his nose. So, not wanting to infringe too much on Joly and Bossuet’s privacy, he carefully walked into their room (Musichetta had left before he woke up) waved the coffee near his face, placed it on the bedside table, and ran out. Combeferre was harder to wake, as he always got silently grumpy when woken up, so he had just grown accustomed to flicking the philosophy major on the nose and running away. As for Jehan, he woke up to the slightest touch, so Courfeyrac always surprised him. Today, he went for tugging lightly at his short braid.

Thirty minutes later, after they exchanged grunts that passed for morning’s greetings and made their breakfasts from whatever was lying around the kitchen, they were all set up to work again. In the center of their little circle Éponine, Marius, and Bahorel were still dozing in a heap, and Bossuet was still snoring in his room, but they’d be up soon enough as well.

By 2pm, they had already finished most of the food that everyone had brought, save for the gigantic salad. Because, as the mother hen of the group, Combeferre always insisted on bringing something green and healthy to balance out the overwhelming amount of junk food.  Of course, everyone bitched and made fun of him for it, but by the end of day three they always felt so greasy and disgusting that the salad was a welcome change.

Enjolras, who lost weight far too easily, was already starting to look gaunt and pale. The circle of everyone’s things that Cosette had accumulated when no one was looking had grown threefold. Joly’s humor was starting to become darker and more morbid. Marius had gotten so confused that he started switching between English, French, and German – the three languages he’s fluent in – without realizing it. And Courfeyrac had already stripped down to his boxers, then bundled himself back up about nine times by now.

But Courfeyrac’s favorite little quirk to watch develop in their group was Jehan’s. Whenever the poet’s workload started to overwhelm him, he had to put down his books and pick up a thin liquid pen (it was easy with Cosette’s collection) and start doodling. He would draw anything from simple curly q’s to ornate pictures. And what’s even better, is that he always had to draw on skin.

Jehan would start with his own arms and legs, but pretty quickly he ran out of room, and had to start doodling on others. So, if anyone was just reading or taking a break, he’d come over and ask to start drawing on them. And since it was Jean Prouvaire, no one could keep themselves from agreeing.

Bahorel was drawn on first, as he was the quickest to take breaks, and wound up with intricately woven Celtic knots running from underneath his eyes to trace the edges of his face, and ending at the temples. With the ginger hair and the stocky build, Bahorel looked like the spitting image of a Celtic warrior.

Sometime after lunch, Courfeyrac came back to the living room from the kitchen with two slices of pie, one for himself and one for Marius, and he saw Jehan drawing in a dark forest green on Cosette. He was making her look like a beautiful woodland nymph, drawing vines with leaves and butterflies twisting around the crown of her forehead, and down her face to frame her jaw. Next to her, Bossuet had Thor’s Hammer (the symbol, not the Marvel cartoon design) on the top of his skull.

A few hours later, the far more conservative Combeferre had fireworks drawn on his hands and wrists in several different colors, and Marius had Egyptian hieroglyphs running vertically from his lips, down his chin, and to his collarbone.

By the end of the night, Joly had simple fractals spiraling up his left arm, and Éponine had spider webs stretching out from the corners of her eyes, making her look like a morbidly sexy Cleopatra. He’d actually cat-called her, because with Éponine’s olive skin and long dark brown hair, she looked positively exotic.

Courfeyrac couldn’t wait for when Jehan got to him. 

The next day at breakfast, while everyone was finishing up the salad, Joly looked up at them and said that they were going to need to start ordering out to get food. While that wasn’t a problem for most of them, Éponine, Marius, and Jehan tensed noticeably.

Combeferre must’ve noticed the response as well, because he immediately said, “I’ve got lunch.”

“Dinner,” Bahorel bellowed, though most of the sound was muffled by the pillow his face was buried in, as the rowdy Junior was still half asleep.

“Bossuet and I can do breakfast,” Joly supplied helpfully.

“I’ll do lunch,” Courfeyrac said with a wide grin. “And I have no doubt that our last supper will be courtesy of Enjy’s father.”

“Last supper, Courf? Really?” Marius asked with a mildly disapproving grin.

Courfeyrac grinned and shrugged in response. “Well what else would you call the last night before finals begin?”

Jehan chuckled and threw an eraser at his head. The pink piece of rubber hit its mark right in the back of his skull and bounced off carelessly. Without a word, Cosette, who had just arrived again this morning from her father’s house scooped up the abandoned eraser, and found it a new home in the slowly growing wall of things in her workspace.

\-----

Grantaire trudged up to the small house and went to knock before remembering the descriptions that Éponine had used when she texted him after work. It had sounded like a gigantic pile of crazy crap locked in a room. Best not release that into the neighborhood. He tried the door and upon finding it unlocked, stepped inside.

“Alright, who ordered what and who’s paying?”  He called out in greeting as he navigated his way to the living room.

The sight that met him was hilarious. The living room had been adjusted so all the furniture created a large semi-circle in the middle of the room. Piles of bedding sat in the middle where they all clearly slept together, and overflowing bags lined the outside of the room. Half of his friends were wrapped in blankets or sleeping bags as they worked, and food packaging was strewn across the mess. Notebooks, laptops, and textbooks were everywhere.

“I’m paying,” Combeferre said, walking over to him with the money and waving for the check to sign.

While the philosophy major curled over the check, a mostly naked Courfeyrac swooped down to lunge at the bag of sandwiches and the coffee holders. Struggling very hard not to ask what kind of drugs everyone was on, Grantaire backed away with a nervous chuckle, and further stared at the room.

He wasn’t even going to comment on what looked to be a pagan circle from the depths of the junk drawer that Cosette was sitting in. After a few weeks of getting to know the blonde freshman in Amis meetings, he’d just accepted that she was a lovable oddball and decided not to ask questions.

“So, which demonic hell spawn has our little lark been summoning today?”

Well, there went that plan. Grantaire winced at his own words, and opened his mouth to apologize. Before he could say anything though, Cosette turned around and gave him a wide grin.

“Well how else do you think we ordered lunch?” she said cheekily.

Grantaire’s worry immediately fell away into a deep laugh. Marius took a moment to look up from his giant-ass law book to grin smugly at him, as if saying _yeah, and she’s my girlfriend._ He was mainly just glad that the joke had gone over so well, because Cosette looked exactly like those girls who never got over a jab at their expense. Then again, he should’ve known that Cosette would always find a way to catch him off guard.

But even so, he _definitely_ wasn’t going to ask about the drawings covering almost everyone’s faces and arms.

Combeferre handed the check and the money to him, and he redirected his attention to making sure everything was in order before he decided to start his lunch break. The tip was far more generous than he expected, and he was about to protest but Combeferre’s face shut him up.

There wasn’t any pity or reassurance in his expression; in fact there was nothing to suggest that the philosophy major knew how large of a tip he’d given. Instead, he just looked grateful for the food, and even offered him an apologetic smile, as if he was asking Grantaire to excuse the mess and half-crazed college kids. This wasn’t out of charity or friendship, Grantaire realized with a smile, the student genuinely thought that was the amount he was due.

That was the only reason Grantaire would consent to accepting such a tip.

Before his face gave anything away, he dipped his head and looked over the check, struggling to read Combeferre’s neatly printed signature.

“Does this say Combeferre Eisenkramer?” Grantaire asked incredulously. At the student’s bemused nod, he couldn’t help but laugh. “Seriously, you don’t have to use a fake name. We won’t hunt you down and leave fliers in your mailbox.”

At that, Combeferre laughed as well before saying, “Seriously, that’s my real name.”

Grantaire’s eyes widened, but before he could stumble over multitudes of apologies, and possible self-flagellation, Courfeyrac swooped in with a mouthful of sandwich to reassure him.

“Yeah, parents of the year award,” he said, ruffling Combeferre’s hair as he walked by. “Combeferre Eisenkramer.”

Grantaire turned back to the philosophy major in question, and was relieved to see that he was smiling. Even so, he was very quick to change the subject. He went to grab the empty food bag, and found one sandwich still inside. It was the Caprese sandwich with balsamic reduction on baguette. Seeing as every other sandwich was full of meat (save Cosette’s, because she just ordered avocado on bread and called it a sandwich) it had to be Enjolras’.

“Hey, where’s the fearless leader?” he asked, waving the sandwich to demonstrate a point.

“Dining room,” Bossuet answered with a smile, pointing to the room in question. “We’ll be eternally grateful if you can get the dumbass to eat something. He looks like he’s about ready to keel over.”

Grantaire cocked his head in confusion and turned to follow Bossuet’s directions. He was far from prepared for what he saw though. The living room gave off a comfortable feeling, despite the massive clutter, partially because it felt lived in, and somehow relaxed. There was food everywhere, and people were leaning on each other’s clothes, books, and bodies. And if the living room was the comfortable mess, then the dining room was harsh and unwelcoming. And Enjolras in the epicenter looked nothing like the Apollo he was used to.

There were piles of paper across the entire dining room table (and probably anticipating the Amis taking over, it was a big table) and books were cracked open on chairs around him. He sat in a single wooden chair, with his computer on his lap. There was a neatly packed duffel bag in the corner. The orderly piles and careful system (he had no doubt that there was some form of a system in order) looked chaotic, and the mess looked tightly drawn in its order.

Enjolras was in familiar red t-shirt and jeans, curled over a book, furiously reading through his annotations and taking notes on his laptop. What worried Grantaire so much was how drawn and shaky he looked. Instead of the calm, confident marble statue he remembered from speeches, the student leader was shaky and tense. The red shirt that was usually so deliciously form-fitted was hanging on him awkwardly. And when Grantaire walked up to face him, he could see deep bags underneath his eyes, and a gaunt-looking face.

“Enjolras,” he said carefully, trying to get his attention despite standing right in front of him. There was no response, and he wasn’t even sure if the blond had heard him at all. So Grantaire reached over and repeated the man’s name, this time reaching out to lay a hand on his shoulder.

At the touch, Enjolras started and looked up. His eyes were glazed over, and unfocused, but after a few moments he seemed to connect what he was seeing.

“R?” he asked hazily.

Grantaire sighed at the obvious sleep deprivation and possible lack of food in the guy’s stomach. He knew that it wasn’t entirely the guy’s fault; Enjolras was a single-minded individual and that meant that when he was focused on a task, everything else seemed to disappear. Unfortunately, that also meant that the kid would forget meals, and ignore the need to sleep.

“I brought you lunch,” he explained, making it as simple as possible for the student.  Even so, Enjolras looked confused, as if trying to work through the words. For several moments, he just stared at him in confusion, so long that Grantaire started to wonder if he’d even heard him. Finally though, the words seemed to sink in.

“I’ll eat later,” he said in response and tried to turn back to his work.

Grantaire wouldn’t let him.

“When was the last time you ate?”

“Morning,” he said. It sounded like a question.

Grantaire turned to look away from him for a moment and called out to Combeferre, who was currently hanging out with Éponine, eating his sandwich.

“When did he last eat?” he called over, no shame or subtlety.

“Morning,” Combeferre returned with a sigh. “Yesterday.”

 Grantaire sighed and ran a hand over his face, before turning back to the blond and shaking his head.

\-----

Enjolras had barely noticed when Grantaire arrived with ten coffees and a gigantic bag of sandwiches. To be fair though, Enjolras had barely noticed anything for three days now. Earlier this morning he’d asked where the cashews had gone, and Combeferre had told him that they’d finished them two days ago. He was running on four hours of sleep, if that, and hadn’t so much as looked up from his international law books in the past eight hours.

Somewhere between days two and three (he couldn’t remember if today was day three or four) he had adopted a sort of tunnel vision. He could stare at the words on the page, whatever work was in his line of focus held a sharp clarity, but the world around that singular point was blurry. Everything seemed to be moving sluggishly, and he alone had to defy movement and work faster. Finals were the last push for the semester, and he couldn’t mess this up. But he would read over his work and sentences would be missing from paragraphs, and he had confused homophones a few times. All the more reason that he didn’t have a moment to spare for the rest of the Amis in the next room.

He wasn’t sure if he considered them a distraction or not. Every semester after midterms or finals he always questioned whether it was smarter for him to just work in the library away from them and the distractions they caused. But it was times like these, when he couldn’t answer questions about what they’d been doing, or what has been happening in the next room for at least the past several hours, when he couldn’t really hold them to blame for his productivity.

Words swam around him and thoughts were still trying to form in his mind when he felt a jarring hand on his shoulder, and he jumped from the sudden contact. He hadn’t realized anyone was so nearby, and when he looked up, he was further puzzled by a set of huge sky blue eyes and a mop of corkscrew curls.

“R?” he asked.

Wasn’t Grantaire supposed to be working this week? That was why Feuilly wasn’t here. Enjolras’ vision determined his point of focus, and he really ought to go back to the work sitting on his lap. The weight of the computer was irritating him, but he was so confused that he found himself still staring at the man’s face, unsure of what he was doing there, and if the moving lips meant that he was saying words.

Oh. He’d asked a question. Enjolras tried to focus on what was just said, and finally gave a response, hoping that he’d said the correct thing.

But then the man was taking his laptop and textbook away, and pulling him up to stand on his feet. Enjolras swayed, not prepared for the sudden rush to his head, and his vision going black for a moment. Grantaire seemed prepared for it though, and placed a hand on the small of his back, and handed him something.

“Eat that,” Grantaire urged, and pulled him away from the dining room, past the living room, and into the family room where Musichetta, Joly, and Bossuet kept another couch and the television. It had always just been like another living room to Enjolras, but it pleased the triad to have two of them (one with a TV, one without) so he never commented.

Grantaire sighed and grabbed the thing out of his hands and unwrapped it, to reveal that sandwich that he liked at Grantaire’s little sandwich shop. The cynic pressed the food back into his hands and spoke again.

“Eat the sandwich or I promise that one of those giant ass textbooks are going to get it,” he said with a quirk of a smile. "I have access to marinara sauce."

Enjolras finally understood, and chuckled slightly. Slowly, he took a bite into the sandwich (it was flavorful as always) and let himself be lowered down to the couch.

“I have a lot to do,” he protested.

“I don’t care,” Grantaire said strongly, leaving no room for debate. It was strange, because normally all they did was debate. “I want you to take a break, eat your damn lunch, maybe even let Jehan do one of those little drawings on you like he did with everyone else.”

Enjolras let himself be told, and took another bite of the sandwich. Hunger started to return to him with it, and soon he was at the sandwich with a newfound fury, taking large bites and eating far more quickly than he normally did. Somewhere in the back of his mind, something was trying to warn him that he’d make himself sick, but it wasn’t loud enough for him to really hear it.

Grantaire sighed next to him and rubbed his back from the base of his neck down to between his shoulder blades. The contact was minimal and friendly, but still strange and unfamiliar. He didn’t like to be touched, Enjolras reminded himself. He wasn’t used to that kind of human contact, or the intricacies of friendship. But his nerves were still short-circuiting from the piles of work left in the dining room, and he couldn’t bother himself with trying to pull away. Grantaire’s hand was warm and the touch was repetitive and soothing. So instead, he let himself ease into the couch and continue to eat his lunch.

“Your lips are really dry,” Grantaire said suddenly.

Before Enjolras had much of a chance to comprehend that, or think of a response, the cynic had left the room. He heard him and Joly talk briefly in the living room, and then Grantaire was back with a tall glass of water in his hands.

Enjolras couldn’t help but feel slightly babied when Grantaire shoved the glass into his hands and told him to drink it. But even so, he did as he was told, and breathed out a sigh of relief that he wasn’t expecting. Like with the food, he hadn’t realized how thirsty he was until the water actually went down his throat. He’d been practically inhaling coffee for the past few days, but water? He wasn’t sure when the last time he’d drank that was.

“We’re going to turn on the TV, we’re going to watch a Friends, and you’re going to rest,” Grantaire said forcefully.

Enjolras finished the rest of his sandwich, took another gulp of water, and couldn’t help but nod in agreement. A wave of fatigue hit him unexpectedly, and he sagged backwards into the couch next to Grantaire. It wasn’t as comfortable as the big, red monstrosity in Grantaire and Éponine’s apartment, but he was beyond the point of caring. Well beyond the point of analyzing the comparison.

Sometime soon after Grantaire and Éponine had assimilated themselves into the Amis, Enjolras had let it slip that he wasn’t much of a television watcher, and that he’d never seen the show Friends before. Grantaire had reacted to the statement as if he’d just blasphemed in the man’s house of worship or something, because the next day he’d texted him to say that Enjolras was coming over to his apartment sometime before the Amis meeting to watch Friends with him.

Enjolras had scoffed at the time, but he later found himself on the giant red couch after classes, power-watching the first nine episodes of season one, surprised by how much he’d enjoyed it. He enjoyed the characters, the simple nature of the plot, and the interactions between everyone. Hell, he’d even enjoyed Grantaire’s little tidbits of commentary, gushing over how wonderful Phoebe and Chandler were, and little annoyed rants at Ross’ expense.

Though most of the correspondence he had with Grantaire was endless debating over texts (which bled into the beginnings of some meetings), the cynic also made time to drag him away from homework every so often to have a mini-Friends marathon.

He had maybe two days left before finals testing started, and he was nowhere near ready for any of it, but he couldn’t argue with Grantaire’s assertion, and just let the cynic turn on the TV.

\-----

Éponine stared at the two of them on Musichetta’s (yes, it was specifically Musichetta’s, not either of the boys’) couch, curled up and watching Friends. It was very rare that Grantaire put on his “Dad” voice, but she grinned widely as he used it to get Enjolras to eat. The rest of the Amis sat, gaping in the living room, food wrappers scattered around, watching and listening to the entire thing.

Joly, who was still standing near the doorway to the TV room after having gotten Grantaire that glass of water he’d asked for, turned to look at the rest of them with wide eyes.

“Guys, he’s actually eating!”

Lunch time had quickly become a communal break during this odd “Hibernation” thing. Everyone put down their work, ate lunch, and hung out. Couches, chairs, and beanbag chairs were abandoned, and they all sat together on the floor, on top of the sleeping bags. Today’s topic of conversation, she had no doubt, would be whatever was going on between her roommate and their leader.

“Oh. My. God. Could they _be_ more in love?” Bossuet said as he moved down from the couch and dug into his wrap.

“One does get the urge to just smash their faces together,” Courfeyrac agreed, mouth still full of mashed chicken and apricot jam, which he swore was a delicious combination.

Grantaire still hadn’t come out to the group yet, and Jehan and Courfeyrac were true to their words, but the longing glances he shot at Enjolras during every single meeting was near impossible to miss. And it didn’t help that one of them would arrive at meetings, and the other would immediately spring on them, holding up their phones and continuing on some debate that no one else was part of, or had context for.

“Y’think all that arguing is their substitute for sex?” Jehan asked curiously, a little smile gracing his face.

Jehan, who had spent the past few days doodling on all of them, seemed to have hit the most stressful part of his finals studying, as he had been squirming nervously in his armchair trying to work for a good part of the morning. It was nice to see him away from his laptop, and doodling again.

The last person unmarked was Courfeyrac, and she couldn’t help but wonder if the poet had saved him for last, simply because of how much more of a canvas he had with the sophomore. After all, she’d seen more of Courfeyrac shirtless in the past few days than she’d seen of any other man ever. Jehan looked like he was planning to use it too, because he was drawing tiny lines from the tips of the pre-law’s fingers, all the way up to his elbow. It looked at the moment like cracked glass running up his arm, the tips of his fingers and elbow being designed to look like origin points of the break.

Everyone’s head shot up at Jehan’s words, as if the idea just crossed their minds.

“Well _now_ we do!” Bahorel said loudly, clearly not pleased with the image.

Éponine grinned and stood up, breaking away from the group and moving to the doorway to watch them. When she got there, Combeferre was standing a few feet away, still in the kitchenette, watching as well.

A Friends episode was on and the theme music had just started, but already it looked like Enjolras was on the verge of dozing off to sleep. The two men weren’t touching, but there was only a few inches of space between them. Grantaire sat comfortably, with a pillow in his lap and his arms loosely crossed over his chest. Enjolras sprawled a bit more, with his legs far apart, and his arms hanging limply at his side. The first line of the song came on, and to Éponine’s shock, Enjolras’ fingers tapped out on the couch the four beat clap that followed it.

She and Grantaire had a joking habit of clapping to the beat in the song every time it came on, but it had taken a long time for the joke to evolve, and even longer for it to become an instinctive habit. She turned to Combeferre, who was also looking at the pair with a peculiar smile on his face.

“Three months,” she mouthed to him, shaking her head with a slight laugh. She had no doubt that this would all blow up (although she had no clue how) in three months.

Combeferre turned to look at them and surprising her, shook his head.

“Four,” he corrected with a little half grin.

Éponine looked back at the two on the couch for a moment. Knowing Grantaire as well as she did, everything would build up inside him until he went crazy, ran away from it, and then eventually let it explode at the worst possible time. And yet, Combeferre knew Enjolras almost as well as she knew Grantaire.

“Four?”

“Four,” he repeated, then glanced back to the rest of the Amis whispering in a circle. “But don’t let them know I said that.”

Éponine smirked and nodded before walking back to rejoin said group, sitting down next to Cosette. For a few weeks after the elementary school trip, she’d hoped that Marius would talk to her, realize that she was totally shallow, or vain, or dull, and the mindless crush would be over. But it didn’t take too long to realize that it wasn’t happening, because Cosette was a sweetheart. Despite the very innocent aura, fixation on clothing and accessories, and mild kleptomania (one of the first diagnoses of Joly’s that she agreed with wholeheartedly) Cosette was one of the most impossible people to hate.

Finally, after the girl had taken over her life at almost every turn, Éponine realized that she couldn’t bring herself to hate the girl, and approached her for lunch, thinking that she would take it to mean grabbing a bite in the cafeteria. Instead, she’d wound up at the girl’s (ginormous) house, with a full home cooked meal of lamb chops with goat cheese in a blueberry reduction sauce, and a three layered chocolate mousse cup.

It had been too much and Éponine almost snapped at her for it, until she saw how anxious the girl had looked. She’d realized in that instant that it wasn’t about money differences, or guilt over Marius (which Cosette seemed thankfully unaware of), or even some sort of bribery. She relaxed and began to talk with her. Cosette admitted that she was a bit intimidated by her as the only other female of the group, and having lived a sheltered life, never really had girl friends. Before she knew it, Éponine was reassuring her that she would fit in perfectly into the Amis, and that she would love it if they became friends.

And for the most part, Éponine hadn’t regretted it in the slightest.

“Text from Feuilly,” Courfeyrac said with a wave. “He’s adding ten bucks to the pot, putting it on a month. Bahorel?”

Éponine laughed as she figured out what they were doing. A pool was starting up on how long it would take for the Grantaire and Enjolras thing to blow up. Courfeyrac was writing down bets and money owed on his phone.

“Thirty on two weeks or less,” he said loudly.

“Five for a month and a half,” Marius said with a shrug.

“Same,” Jehan echoed.

“Joly and I will collectively add fifteen for two months,” Bossuet said with a grin.

“Yo Ep, wanna get in on this?” Courfeyrac asked her with a grin.

She thought for a few minutes, before pulling out her wallet and holding up a twenty. With one last glance towards the doorframe and the kitchenette, she made up her mind and dropped the bill into the pile

“Twenty on four months.”

\-----

At some point, Enjolras had actually fallen asleep on Grantaire, and so Courfeyrac had been called in to help move him off so the cynic could get back to work. It was a shame that they could only see him on his lunch breaks, but he came up the next day for lunch as well.

With only one day left until testing actually started, tensions were high for everyone. He had to wake everyone up in the mornings, since no one asked to be allowed to sleep in anymore. Cosette’s piles were actually becoming shaky, it was getting so tall. Tall of course being no more than six inches off the ground, but for a strange pile of stuff, that was pretty good.

He’d asked her what the circle was for at one point.

“It’s a circle of protection. To fight off the stress of finals,” she’d said as if it was obvious.

“So… is it some kind of Wiccan thing?” he’d asked slowly, still not quite understanding how shoes, sweatshirts, textbooks, and pencil cases could become a protective circle. Wasn’t it supposed to be sage and salt or whatnot?

“No,” she’d chuckled. “Friends protect you and give you strength. These are all yours, so your presence is all around me, protecting me from finals.”

With that, he’d grinned widely and kissed her on the forehead before heading back to his own work. But he kept a close eye on his friends. They all had seemed to move closer together as the days crept by. Joly had all but sprawled his legs across Bossuet’s lap, Marius was curled up just outside the circle next to Cosette, and everyone else was leaning against each other or in physical contact somehow.

Enjolras was the only exception, still running around in the dining room working. The small comfort he took away from Enjolras though, was that he looked better than he did yesterday. Grantaire’s force feeding him and getting him to finally take a nap had done a world of good, and the fact that he’d succeeded twice in a row spoke volumes. Courfeyrac sure wouldn’t have protested if the cynic had chosen to include an extra charge on the bill, specifically for feeding their leader.

Jehan was the other one notably stressed out. He apparently had some big portfolio due in his poetry workshop that could determine whether or not he got into the next class he needed for the major, because it filled up quickly and as a freshman he wasn’t a priority.

Because of that, Jehan had approached him yesterday to ask about doodling on him. Before the poet had even been able to ask, Courfeyrac had pulled off his unbuttoned shirt and agreed enthusiastically. After all, he’d just been reviewing his notes for tests at this point. He’d gotten his essays and presentation out of the way a while ago. For the rest of the day, and even into today he refused to put a shirt on, despite being a bit chilly.

Jehan had done his left arm first, making it look like cracked glass running up from a few origin points on his fingertips and elbow. Then he’d done the same to his right arm later on that afternoon so it was a mirror.

Today, Jehan took the cracks and transitioned them to look like roots that wrapped around his shoulders and towards the base of his neck on his back. After lunch, he’d snuck into the bathroom, and had been amazed to see how the black pen cracks had been shifted into brown pen roots, which sloped into a trunk going down his spine.

They all took another break for dinner. This time, Courfeyrac had swiped Enjolras’ wallet (it was far too easy) to pay for the final dinner before the four days of testing began. Had Courfeyrac been studying for finals on his own, he would have been forced to study all the way through testing days, cramming last bits of information into his head minutes before the exams. Because of hibernation though, he had the time (and the pressure from everyone else) to actually do it, and so he’d only have to quickly review the night before.

As they all ate their overly greasy Chinese food, they all chatted lightly, and Jehan continued to doodle on his back. It was oddly soothing for him, as the pen kind of tickled, and he knew that drawing had calmed the poet down as well.

Before he got ready for bed, he checked the mirror one last time to see that the trunk had become a full willow tree, inverted down his spine. It was a very simple design, and yet it looked intricate, and mysterious, and altogether wonderful. He fell asleep early that night (he was just as surprised as the rest of them) having finished the last bit of his studying before he thought he would. Instead of curling up in his sleeping bag though, he just collapsed on top of it, lying on his stomach wearing nothing but boxers and sweatpants, just in case Jehan got stressed later and wanted to add to the design.

The next morning he woke up at 7:30 on the nose. Combeferre, Éponine, Joly, Marius, and Jehan had already left, since they all had 7:25 morning classes to get to. He didn’t have a class to get to until 9:45, so he rooted around the refrigerator until he found someone’s leftover spring rolls and pulled them out for a cold breakfast. Afterwards, when he headed towards the bathroom to brush his teeth and wash his face. The shattered glass and tree trunk remained unchanged, and not added to.

Gathering up his bookbag and clothes, he kept the black sweatpants on, and pulled on a thin white wife-beater for a shirt, ignoring that it was mid-December. Everyone walked into finals in sweatpants and sweatshirts, with knotty hair and bags under eyes, so it wouldn’t be considered odd to dress comfortably. Besides, he wanted to show off the awesome drawings as much as possible, and he was sure the rest of the Amis would be going into finals with pen on their faces and arms.

Just as he was about to pull on sneakers, he noticed writing on the bottoms of his left foot in Jehan’s neat handwriting. With a tiny smile, he sat down on the floor and picked up both his feet, seeing writing on both of them. The words were surrounding by opening quotation marks on his left foot, and closing quotation marks on his right foot, so it was structured like prose, but Courfeyrac could almost hear the line breaks in the poet’s voice. This was undoubtedly a poem.

 _“Lost, I wander, But never alone._ It read eloquently, even sounding like Jehan. _My friend, my salvation, my home.”_

With a wide grin, Courfeyrac made a pot of coffee and poured it into two disposable travel mugs, finished getting ready for his first two tests today, and headed out the door. With a quick glance at his phone, he confirmed that he had enough time to get to the writing building before 7:25 testing finished. Just in case though, Courfeyrac sped up his pace so he could meet his friend after class with coffee to congratulate him on his first final out of the way. 

**Author's Note:**

> A truly amazing thing happened! One of my incredible readers, Chainofprospit, asked followers to submit to them phrases that would appear on t-shirt slogans from Enjolras' event in Lost in Fallacy, and created a cloud of the responses. It is truly beautiful, and I was touched and humbled upon reading it. For everyone who contributed and took part in it, I want to tell all of you that I love you, from the bottom of my heart. 
> 
> If you want to check it out, here's the link:
> 
> http://tagul.com/preview?id=147715@1&name=One%20to%20Three%20Words


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